The “experts” are not always correct, which is why we should give every human being every chance.
Here’s just a couple of examples, where the “experts” were wrong:
“For example, in 2008 Zack Dunlap was declared brain-dead after an ATV accident based on exactly the same criterion offered in Jahi’s case: a PET scan revealed that he had no blood flowing to his brain. His body was prepared for organ harvesting, but alert family members were able to elicit behavioral signs that showed he was anything but brain dead. Forty-eight days later, Zack walked out of a rehab center and went home.
Colleen Burns was another example of how fallible a medical diagnosis of brain death can be. Admitted to a hospital in Syracuse, New York, after a drug overdose, she, like Zack Dunlap, was declared brain dead and prepared for organ harvesting. She woke up on the operating table shortly before the operation began, and was discharged shortly thereafter.”
Read more: Remember the Humanity of Jahi McMath | TIME.com http://ideas.time.com/2014/01/07/remember-the-humanity-of-jahi-mcmath/#ixzz2plc3UXVN
A PET scan apparently was the only test performed on Zach Dunlap to come up with the diagnosis of brain death but because his brain was swollen, PET scans are often not reliable. Again the hospital did not follow standards and procedures. Jahi has on the other hand been confirmed to be brain dead, not just by a PET scan but a multitude of other tests performed by several doctors including one not affiliated with Children’s Hospital appointed by the court and over the course of, not hours or days but over several weeks.
Here is an informative article written by a neurologist who discusses why and what may have been the problems with Dunlap’s case.
http://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/brain-dead/
Colleen Burns was another example of how fallible a medical diagnosis of brain death can be. Admitted to a hospital in Syracuse, New York, after a drug overdose, she, like Zack Dunlap, was declared brain dead and prepared for organ harvesting. She woke up on the operating table shortly before the operation began, and was discharged shortly thereafter.”
She was not declared brain dead, she was thought to have undergone “cardiac death” but all in all, proper procedures were not followed and several mistakes were made, the hospital was fined but this was not a case of someone who was actually and properly diagnosed as being brain dead by several neurologists using multiple tests, coming back to life.
Patient Colleen S. Burns was reportedly admitted into St. Joseph's emergency department in 2009 after overdosing on Xanax, Benadryl and a muscle relaxant. Hospital notes obtained by the Post-Standard revealed that the doctors thought she had undergone "cardiac death." After doctors consulted with the family, they agreed to withdraw life support and donate her organs.
What actually happened was that Burns was in a deep coma from her overdose, and did not have irreversible brain damage.
The Health Department discovered that the staff did not perform a recommended treatment to stop the drugs from being absorbed into her stomach and intestines, did not test to see if she was free of all drugs and did not complete enough brain scans. They also did not wait long enough before recommending the patient was taken off life support.
In addition, her doctors did not pay attention to a nurse's notes which stated that Burns was not brain dead and in fact was getting better. A nurse performing a routine reflex test had discovered that Burns' toes had curled downward after the bottom of her foot was touched.
Despite all the signs that Burns was still alive and had brain function, a nurse injected her with a sedative and failed to note it on the chart.
While certainly the Dunlap and Burns cases should give one pause, should cause families to make sure all the proper diagnostic tests and procedures for diagnosing brain death have been followed and the positive outcome of such extremely rare cases is that doctors and hospitals have become more conservative and cautious to make sure their diagnosis is correct (I believe the standard in CA and in most states is that the brain death diagnosis has to be confirmed by at least one other doctor and that not just one test like a PET scan is performed), this doesn’t mean that all or even a high number of such diagnosis are in error.
In very rare cases were a patient has not been properly diagnosed as brain dead, the patient sometimes recovers seemingly miraculously, but a misdiagnosis of brain death or cardiac death followed by recovery, is not the same thing as a truly brain dead person coming back to life. That simply does not, cannot happen.